The winners of «The Time of the Guitar» Composer Competition have been announced in Moscow
The winners of the Seventh International Guitar Time Composer Competition have been announced.
The winners of «The Time of the Guitar» competition-festival, the most prestigious guitar composer competition in Russia, have been determined in Moscow, which has launched the preparation of the eponymous competition-the festival of classical guitar performers, which will be held in November 2026.
The highest award of the competition — First Prize — was awarded to the composition "Suite for Solo Guitar" by Moscow composer Sergei Vasiliev, a student of the famous Moscow professor of composition at the State Music and Pedagogical Institute named after M. M. Ippolitov–Ivanov Efrem Podhaits. The suite will be included in the mandatory program of the competition-festival and will be performed in the second round by the contestants of the competition, and will also be published. The first prize in the nomination "Composition for a children's ensemble" was awarded to Boris Belsky's work "Fabulous Suite for a Quartet of Guitars".
Currently, a collection of works by the winners of the Guitar Time contest is being prepared for release in 2026 by the Muzyka publishing house.
This year, composers from Russia, Belarus, Slovenia and Canada sent their compositions for guitar. A total of 32 scores of works for solo guitar, in an ensemble, and compositions for children's and methodical repertoire were submitted to the competition. Since 2019, the jury of the composer competition has been permanently headed by Vladislav Germanovich Agafonnikov, People's Artist of Russia, Professor at the Moscow Conservatory, who recently celebrated his 90th birthday. According to the chairman of the jury, over the years of the competition, the repertoire of classical guitar has been replenished with talented and original compositions, which are already included in the golden repertoire of modern guitar music.
The artistic director of «The Time of the Guitar» competition-festival — Dmitry Borodaev, Associate Professor of the Moscow Conservatory and President of the Moscow International Association of Guitar Art.